Catawba, VA and The Homeplace

About 4 hours and 30 mins outside of Washington, DC, at the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains and close to the southern entrance of the Skyline Drive is a small town called Catawba, VA.  It's about 45 mins outside of Virginia Tech and a hop, skip and jump from Roanoke, VA.

You may be asking yourself why you should care, well, I've got two words for you...The Homeplace.

The Homeplace is a down home cookin' restaurant that serves all of it's food family style and  you have two options, roast beef or ham.  Of course, that's in addition to the default fried chicken, some of the best Allen has ever had, and sides that automatically come with each order.

The mashed potatoes, green beans, pinto beans and coleslaw were divine.  The mashed potatoes were REAL.  The green beans were just the right amount of porky and salty and the beans were tender.  But the biscuits, OMG, the biscuits were buttery, light, fluffy and beautiful.

Needless to say, I highly recommend stopping by this place before driving the Skyline Drive.  It's worth the stop.

Blue Mountain Brewery Afton, VA

Just outside of Charlottesville, VA and a little less than three hours from DC is Blue Mountain Brewery in Afton, VA.  The brewery overlooks the mountains and it's the perfect place to grab a beer with friends after a rough week at work.  They've got nice tables outside, the food isn't great, but the beer is worth the trip.  Enjoy!

Overlooking the mountains...

 The samplers...

 The brewery...

Cabins Around DC and Smith Mountain Lake State Park

Last week I set out at trying to reserve a cabin in the woods.  There were three criterion:  first, it had to be in a state park.  State park cabins are usually cheaper and easier to find.  Second, they had to allow dogs (we have two dogs).  Third, they had to be within a five hour driving range.

We ended up at a beautiful, clean and peaceful cabin about 4 hours outside of DC at Smith Mountain Lake State Park.  We rented the eight person cabin, since it was the only one left.


First, let me give you some hints on finding the perfect cabin.

This site is a great resource for narrowing down your search and reserving a cabin.

http://www.reserveamerica.com/

Choose "Cabins or lodging", tell it your dates and click away. If you want it to only list the state parks (which I suggest) click "State" at the top.

If you're looking for something along the water.  Check out SML.  It's a stunning park on a clear lake.  The cabins are close to each other, but during the off season, you may find that you're the only people in the park. We stayed in Cabin #7, but if you're looking for a smaller cabin on the water, definitely check out cabin #9, 10, 16 and 17 all have dock access and were my favs.

SML Cabin #7.

The dock next to cabin 16 and 17.

Looking outside cabin #7.

Sitting on the dock during the sunset.  We packed a picnic w/ wine (shh...technically you're not supposed to have alcohol.)

DC Escapes

The purpose of this blog is to give DCers who like to explore the area around them some idea of what's out there.  Hope you enjoy the posts.